


17776 - An Intermission Analysis

by vforvesta



Category: 17776: What Football Will Look Like in the Future - Jon Bois
Genre: Essay, this is an essay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-11
Updated: 2017-07-13
Packaged: 2018-11-30 21:42:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,119
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11472258
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vforvesta/pseuds/vforvesta
Summary: It's half-time for the game of the future. I basically talk about why 17776 is brilliant and why we need more stories like it.Also, there's some Homestuck.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> It's a non-fiction essay. And a short one.

If anybody asks me exactly what I would like to do in the future, my answer since 2013 would be to redirect them to Homestuck. It’s tough to explain multimedia internet storytelling, which just gets whittled down to being an author (yes, a book would be nice but that’s not the be all or end all of creative writing), and so giving an example would make things much clearer. However, Homestuck requires a certain degree of investment, mainly in the form of time to even understand at the most basic level. So basically nobody except maybe my sister and my girlfriend understands.

But not anymore.

Enter 17776 - and given that the story should currently be at its halfway point (and I think will be completed by the end of the week) - this is something that people can consume in a single day, and every single element of what I hope to accomplish in the future can be found here. It’s amazing.

Please just go read it first. I implore you.

Very quick digression - it’s no coincidence that 17776 has been compared to Homestuck (like Car Boys) because Homestuck is really the monolith with which to compare all these types of work to. The hope for everyone is that someday that monopoly will fade.

So what is 17776? Well, when you first click on https://www.sbnation.com/a/17776-football (note: spoilers continue on this paragraph, and you should really click on it and read the first chapter before going on at all), after being confused because sbnation apparently is a legitimate sports news site owned by Vox and is prominent enough in America and is basically one of the last platforms to host such a story yet makes perfect sense, you’re thrown into a fantastic disarray that dismantles all expectations (unless you’re expecting it, like you’re still reading this before having clicked the link). There’s that feeling of uncertainty, of discovery, of experiencing something new enough that you just might’ve never experienced it before.

And it is amazing.

What follows… well, what you see is what you get. The link to https://www.sbnation.com/a/17776-football , is framed as a typical article on sbnation, basically: What football will look like in the future. 17776 basically answers this question, it being the entire premise, the thesis of the story. Like yes, it is speculative fiction, but at the same time it is an essay addressing this very issue. The content itself isn’t entirely brand new. The execution is.

17776 is a story of football viewed from space, in the far distant future (the title drop at the end of Chapter 1, shows that the year is essentially 17776), from the point of view of three sentient satellites (Pioneer 9, 10, and JUICE [guess what this acronym stands for] ). Much like Homestuck, characters are distinct and likeable, the dialogue snappy and full of personality. The format is essentially a conversation between the satellites, and their discussions and world building into this seemingly utopian/dystopian future, interspersed with football games as it has evolved throughout the years. Like literally, it’s about what football will look like in the future.

And if you’re entirely caught up (up till intermissions part 1-4), well this part’s for you. Jon Bois has not only created a fantastic narrative, but has so many things to say about his vision about the future. This is a story about space football because… football is literally the central narrative of the future. In a world where a singular piece of revolutionary technology fixes everyone’s problems, and crushed under the weight of immortality and the infinite, the march of time becoming a march of humanity, Jon Bois presents a future that is stagnant, dominated by play. What else is there to do? The frustration of 10 in response to 9’s idealism is raw, jaded, and entirely realistic. Humans never took to the stars because meaningfully exploring it would take up too much time, effort, resources. Perseverance and determination and ambition can only last so long when staring into the abyss of forever. The happiest group of people might just be those stuck between two mountains in a valley, doomed to play a game of football that has lasted 15,000 years and will last 15,000 years more and beyond. It’s exciting. It’s scary. It’s the future - or at least, a future.

The whole point being, we really need more stories like this. 17776 surpasses Homestuck in many ways, even if its scope is lacking. For one, despite a subject matter that doesn’t exactly resonate with the demography of people who consume content on a daily basis, it is framed in such a fresh, and chaotic way that I was instantly sucked in. If its expected length stays at it is, it will be a completed work without the high barriers to entry that Homestuck had. And the premise is clear from the start - part of what makes Homestuck interesting is that it is purposefully a riddle as much as it is a story. You’re left second guessing and tearing your hair out at every corner and that is great but at the same time not for everyone. The more focused, and muted 17776 shows the potential for stories that aren’t grand epics to be dissected by those who can trudge through it, but rather just… another way of telling stories, discussing ideas and themes that are important to us.

And that’s what I want to do.

p.s juice is dave strider and is amazing this is something absolutely everybody can agree on case closed


	2. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't think this would be more than one chapter, but eh. I won't be doing this for every chapter, just probably one more (if any) about the final chapter and/or the series as a whole.
> 
> What a ride.

While I procrastinate writing the things I should be writing, here’s another 17776 essay so I can feel productive while not doing anything of importance. Let’s get to it.

 

So, the format (so far) for 17776 is pretty standard, besides the first chapter (which we’ll get to in a minute). Essentially we zoom in on a particular game, either from the POV of the three satellites, or people on the ground watching the game/part of the game/discussing the game, or both, in a chapter, and the next chapter being exposition talk as 9 gets caught up to speed as to what Earth is like these days, along with some humorous dialogue from JUICE. Exposition chapters are typically videos where the satellites are shown talking (through typing), while jazz music plays in the background and a 3d rendering of the earth either zooms in to the next location of the next game or out, to fit whatever setting or context comes next. Rinse and repeat (besides the intermissions, which could be talked about on its own but that’s not we’re doing here).

 

The rest of this essay will be talking about the very first chapter, which is radically different from the format.

 

So, all the way to the start.

 

Most people greet 17776 in the form of a link. The link preview is innocuous, and looks just like any other link to a benign article. The kind you'd find on Facebook or Tumblr.

 

When you click it... no surprises yet. You're greeted with a typical sbnation format, but as you start to read, the words 'something is terribly wrong' become more prominent before the words literally float off the page in a dissociation of expectations and reality as the screen becomes black, you're then greeted with the date and time.

 

Subsequently, when you arrive at the link for 17776, you're directed to the story's home page, with the chapter directory with the credits.

 

Now, chapter 1 proper.

 

This chapter abuses the infinite scrolling format like no other medium has done before. 90% of this chapter is essentially one monthly calendar after another starting from the year of '43, for... many many years. There is text on the calendar, and it soon becomes apparent that said text is 'spoken' on said day corresponded on the calendar.

 

A calendar format is used because the conversation spans over days, weeks, months, years. This is an incredible way to display the passage of time, with a lot more impact than using a typical chatlog with the date preceding the text. Here, the empty space between the days can be physically seen, and its effects felt. As 9 wakes up, without any idea of what's happening, they are the audience surrogate. They're deep in the mystery of who they are, where they are, what the heck is even going on?

 

And while there is impatience in scrolling through the dates, there is a certain empathy that can be felt with 9 because from their point of view, each square is a full day. That 24 hours can be visualized and taken into account, and 9's desperation becomes that much more valid.

 

The space also gives us time to ponder, hypothesise our own answers to the mystery, who is 10? What is their relationship to 9, given the scarce clues we have been provided with? Friends? Lovers? Family? It becomes apparent that they are in space... comrades perhaps? I cannot stress enough how effective the calendar format is in breathing life into the story and giving it a whole new dimension.

 

Once 9 and 10 are finally able to talk immediately, we get introduced to juice, a hilariously crowning character in their own right. And then the two reveals:

 

First, that they are all sentient satellites. 9 and 10's relationships are instantly rooted in obscure but realistic mythology that we can know and understand, and everything is instantly recontextualised. And the payoff works without being frustrating, because the setup and reveal are in the exact same chapter (while in Homestuck, reveals can take days or even weeks of ploughing through to get to), where everything is fresh, but it doesn't feel rushed because we've experienced a fraction of what 9's gone through, the dull drudgery of the years that has served as buffer in real time to give the mystery room to breathe.

 

And then the title drop.

 

It's a simple yet amazing video, which frames the rest of the story to come, setting the scene and basically answering all the questions that have been asked throughout the course of the chapter, and establishing the new ones that will unfold in the remainder of the story.

 

And that about summaries the chapter. But there’s one last bit I wanna talk about, and it’s - you guessed it - the calendar format.

 

If there was one thing I’d change in this chapter? It would be to put the full length of the twenty seven years of silence in its entirety. It would be tough yeah, but why not just go all the way with an additional, frustrating 324 empty months? (I mean you could just scroll down on the side but I guess that would really be abusing infinite scrolling)

 

This leads into commentary that comes up later, about the true weight of the vast expanse of time. Boredom is the enemy in immortality, and so is efficiency or basically anything that doesn’t occupy your time in entertaining ways. Humans are grasping for ways to be entertained, and play is simply one of the best ways - or at least that’s the thesis of 17776. We don’t bother exploring space because that would be too tiring, too boring, too empty. To even get to the nearest star, it would just be too much time, for a rather predictable result of… nothing.

 

And I guess that would be the frustrating benefit of including the 27 years in its entirety, to show how much time has passed for nine, and experiencing time. It would be brilliant commentary on how we are so starved for activity that we get fed up scrolling for a solid thirty seconds. Like, these losers can't even get through 27 fake years without feeling frustrated. Imagine 5 million real ones?

 

Of course I realise this can be read both ways, in entirely opposite directions. On the one hand, we humans are not immortal, and seek to maximise our experience on earth. Frustration at scrolling through a whole chunk of nothing would be more of impatience than boredom at having our time wasted (although tbh, it really just is about thirty seconds tops, or you could just skip to the end). But the second way would be the reading of having to traverse through emptiness. Which is how I think it should be read, because that’s the whole purpose of the calendar format. For us to experience the effect of waiting, and nothingness.

 

I’m just in awe of the incredibly strong starting of this story. A single chapter packs so much punch, and I can’t wait to see how 17776 will end.


End file.
